Gangster Myer Rush led a colorful and dangerous existence. So dangerous he was the target of an assassination attempt and blown up while sleeping, dying twice enroute to the hospital but surviving. From his first job as a paperboy to wheeling and dealing making millions Myer Rush lived many lives during his time.

Now in the new book, BOMBED IN HIS BED: Confessions of Jewish Gangster Myer Rush (Publication Date: November 1, 2013), Bruce Farrell Rosen has told a story exclusively shared with him by his uncle that had been sought after for years by many journalists from around the world.

“Since the bomb placed under Myer’s bed was rumored to be a Mafia plant, I asked him if he had any bodyguards. He flipped up the corners of some colored comics lying across a coffee table. A revolver pointed lazily toward me. ‘Don’t worry’ he laughed ‘I have a permit for it. The Panamanians will let me carry a machine gun if I want to’.

From multiple award winning Canadian Journalist Sylvia Fraser’s interview in BOMBED IN HIS BED

REVIEWS

“Wow – what a bombshell! Don’t expect to start this book and set it down…”

Merla Zellerbach

Author of several novels including “A-List Murders” – Former S.F. Chronicle Columnist

“…Rosen writes through multiple lenses – journalist, nephew, son, and observer…A beautiful narrative, this book is a wonderful way to get the story out about a less than perfect man who did his best to live life according to his own rules…”

Bonnie Cehovet – Writer/Editor of BonnieCehovet.com

“…There is no way to briefly describe Myer Rush’s life and we can thank his nephew for getting him to share his life for what is a very interesting biography.”

Alan Caruba

Founding Member of the National Book Critic’s Circle “My Picks of the Month”

Full of astonishing recollections, this never-before-told tale has an intimacy rarely achieved due to the gangster/uncle revealing his story to his writer/nephew.

Depicting a life that would take him to all the corners of the globe while acquiring great wealth and notoriety, yet suffering the depths of loss and despair, these pages reveal an astounding journey that traverses love, honor, romance, betrayal, trust, deceit, conspiracy, grief, joy, greed, and the determination to live fully and survive with an absence of fear. It is a story that will challenge our thinking about what a man can endure in life—a mesmerizing ride.

Dying twice on the way to the hospital after being blown up by a bomb thought to have been planted by the mafia, BOMBED IN HIS BED: Confessions of Jewish Gangster Myer Rush by Bruce Farrell Rosen (Publication Date: November 1, 2013), is a true story about a larger-than-life character that lived his days on his own terms and achieved his goals – through whatever means necessary.

Myer Rush survived on the edge by wheeling and dealing his way into millions of dollars. An aura of risk and violence accompanied his adventures. What makes this tale unique is that he told his life story to his own nephew. This intimacy creates a very personal account of a very exceptional rogue.

“…Gangster Myer Rush has told his amazing story to his nephew in equally amazing detail…This “lifetime of memories” written in beautiful, polished prose is a book you won’t forget.”

Merla Zellerbach

Author of several novels including “A-List Murders” – Former S.F. Chronicle Columnist

“Myer’s story had been sought after for many years by many journalists from around the world. He had severe animosity for the press, and the ways in which they had depicted him. Yet, he wanted his story told for the record. And so my mother, Alma, convinced him that his nephew (myself) was a writer of superior quality, and what better than to tell his story to someone he could trust and to whom he could speak as freely as he might wish. Myer followed through on his promise to tell me stories that were “absolutely true,” some of which he never revealed to “anyone at any time.” And when I probed him, asked him why he didn’t know when to stop, why he didn’t save money, did he understand the idea of being greedy, did he know he was going into territory that might be unlawful, he would get angry. He didn’t want introspective self- analysis during these interviews. “Them were the times,” he would say… “I was a product of the times.” “Look kid, don’t sit here and make judgments, just sit back and listen to the story.”

–From the Foreword–

Hailed as a tale of truly heroic proportions about a larger-than-life figure who struggled with his destiny, and with his heart and his soul, BOMBED IN HIS BED takes place all around the world from Canada, to the U.S., London, Paris, Karachi, Havana, Antwerp, Amsterdam, Israel, and Panama. Full of astonishing stories, Myer Rush’s life is unforgettable…

*The wonder sex herb that he discovered and marketed with enormous success.

*The sign business of putting advertisements atop taxis that further enhanced his fortune.

*The buying of companies, promoting them and making millions upon millions doing so.

*Going to Karachi to demand the rubies that he was owed.

*When men broke into his home and beat him with baseball bats and Myer subsequently picking out the intruder in a police line up by busting his jaw and walking away.

*That he was front page news across Canada and much of the world for dying twice on the way to the hospital but surviving a bomb that detonated under his bed at the posh Sutton Place Hotel the night before testifying about a 100 million dollar fraud that was considered by many as the “crime of the century”. No one was ever charged in that case. And it is thought that the padding in the mattress, (manufactured by a relative) which plugged up his wounds thereby stopping the bleeding, saved his life.

Describing a time, an era, a larger than life personality that shocked a City that had been sleepy and provincial but now had to come terms with a Gangland style bombing of a man that somehow survived it, willing to testify against all comers, this book is a powerful, human tale, almost Old Testament in the trials given to a man.

Helping it come alive are the newspaper articles recalling the amazing stories, a personal note from the Toronto reporter who filed an exclusive story on Myer while in Panama, and Myer’s daughter’s gratitude to get to know her dad more intimately through these stories. “I know my dad would be proud of my cousin Bruce for writing this book, so I and the whole world could get to know the true story about Myer ‘Michael’ Rush.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

An investment officer at a major financial firm by day, Bruce F. Rosen is an award-winning writer by night. Sharing the same publisher as literary greats Allen Ginsberg, Laurence Ferlinghetti, and William Saroyan, author Bruce Rosen has been featured in many venues including The Today Show, BBC Radio, The Baseball Hall of Fame, The San Francisco Chronicle, and on the cover of Personal Excellence and Publishers Weekly. The father of two sons, he lives and works in San Francisco.

BOMBED IN HIS BED

The Confessions of Jewish Gangster Myer Rush As Told to His Nephew Bruce Farrell Rosen

ISBN: 978-0-615-84718-4

Price: $16.95; Original Paperback

Publication Date: November 1, 2013

Publisher: Alma Rose Publishing

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An interesting idea for a memoir. Keaton intermixes her mother’s letters with her own story. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. I am not really sure what the point was and if indeed a biography should have a point at all. The book seemed like it was going somewhere, but it never really got there. I think it was meant to tie the lives of the two women together in some deep way, but it never quiet got there for me. I love biographies because they tell me something about the person and I learn from the experience. I grow close to the person and feel sadness and loss when I finish the book. Like my friend has gone. I didn’t feel that with this book. What I learnt about Keaton is that she is an accidental success, despite being kooky and scatterbrained she still managed to be successful. Maybe that’s the learning?

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I have just finished reading this book and was at first a little worried that it would be sad and depressing. Whilst it was a sad read, it was not depressing with many details of the tender moments shared by Lisa and Patrick Swayze during his long illness.

It is a real story about real people in a marriage that had its ups and downs and which culminated in real growth between them as a couple and as individuals.

Lisa Niemi Swayze provides some real tangible solutions to managing the long term illness of a loved one. Her resilience and love for Patrick and his love for her is clear, and comes through in each page of the book.

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This really is a staggeringly good book! For anyone that loves business, works with large corporations or has worked with global giant IBM, this is a must read biography. The story of the founder of IBM, Thomas Watson Sr, and his successor and son, Thomas Watson Jr. This story is beautifully and honestly told by Watson Jr as he recounts the love of a father and son. It was Watson Jr who took IBM into computers and steered it to the company that we know today as a global enterprise.

This book is more than the story of two men’s lives, it gives an account of the management style, ethics and organizational models used in this super successful business that became the blueprint for many modern day consulting companies.

I brought a 1990 copy of this book second hand, as an ex library book, so mine was already well read before I got it. The latest edition, pictured, is testament to its popularity as it remains a study in organizational management and business culture – well worth studying.

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What a story and what a person! The photo on the cover shows Philip Dulhunty as an Australian solider in Hiroshima in 1946 so that will give you some indication of the diversity of the contents. A successful business and family man, he is well known in Australia as a leader in the electricity power transmission industry (Dulhunty Power), and has much involvement in the marine and aviation industries too. Now well into his eighties, he can still often be seen flying his Cessna float plane over the Sydney Harbour Bridge on his way to some seaplane gathering or event, a realm he just revels in and is known throughout the country for.

We are fortunate to know Philip personally and have a signed copy of his book which my husband, (also a keen seaplane pilot), purchased. He has read the book, so the review is from his perspective. If you love adventure and love aeroplanes (especially seaplanes) then you will love reading about the amazing life so wonderfully described in this biography.

This is a beautifully produced book, A4 in size and 445 pages. For those that are tactile, like me, it feels nice to hold and the photographs that are included are of very high quality. Written and told in a story like fashion by Philip Dulhunty himself, it is just packed with information about a life lived to the full!

About the Book;

Philip Dulhunty, OAM, has lived a life packed with adventure, narrow escapes from death and truly remarkable achievements in the realms of business, aviation and sailing. A self-taught engineer, his technical innovations and entrepreneurial drive have helped transform the face of the global electricity-supply industry. This autobiography traces Philip’s story from his idyllic childhood at Port Macquarie through to his current role as a doyen of the power industry. Not only does it chart his highly successful career as a businessman, it also covers his army service during World War Two and the unforgettable period that he spent in atom-bomb devastated Japan with the Allied Occupation Forces. Written with Philip’s trademark sense of humour, the book romps along. It’s full of memorable anecdotes, dangerous encounters with hijackers, villains and crashing planes, and ends with Philip’s compelling solution to one of Australia’s greatest wartime mysteries.

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I was extremely fortunate to be asked by author Dane Batty, to review his first biography “Wanted Gentleman Bank Robber”. Dane Batty is the maternal nephew of Leslie Ibsen Rogge and remembers his uncle coming in and out of his own life as a child. He remembers the unconditional love shown to Ibsen by his ( Batty’s) own mother (Rogge’s sister) not realising the full extent of Rogge’s adventures until he was older. Batty has put together this biography of his uncle using letters once written between his uncle and Batty’s mother, as well as first hand accounts from Rogge himself.

This biography is a true account of Rogge, who was one of the FBI‘s most elusive criminals. He was known to rob banks in a “gentlemanly” style, amassing many millions of dollars over a thirty years! All the while managing to live a fairly normal if not adventurous life on the run, evading constant FBI and Police surveillance – complete with a family (or two) and a dog.

This story is clearly told with love by Batty who has a relaxed informative writing style. When I found Batty was a technical writer, I worried that I would find information only and not a story. Beautifully and faithfully told, Batty does give us a story and a feeling of connection to Rogge through this biography. For those of us outside the US and not familiar with the story, I found it a little disjointed in parts and had to re-read sections a couple of times to understand where Rogge was, why he was there and how it fitted with the time line.

I love biographies and for me what makes a really good one is the reader’s ability to get to know the person (the subject) – to understand the person that the book is about. I ask myself “why am I interested?” in this biography. I like to learn something of the person that the biography is about so I would have liked to see a bit more about why Rogge was driven to commit so many crimes, why didn’t he seem to understand it was wrong. I wanted to know more about the other people in his life. There are references to Rogge’s friends and family, many of whom had a hard time with the police and FBI, but I would have liked to know more about the reason’s they protected Rogge and that didn’t come across clearly enough for me. Was this guy so charismatic that people were just naturally drawn to him or was he an expert con artist as well? In an early chapter “Learning to Run” I was not sure what happened to his wife and children when he left the property. Good biographies give accounts of other people’s feelings towards the subject, you get to understand the impact that the subject had on other people through their own account and this gives you an insight into the subjects motivations and character. I didn’t find enough of this information and felt that the book could have been further developed in some areas, so it rounded out my experience of Rogge.

I thought that Rogge was extremely unlikable early in the book and was glad to see that he later had some realisation of the cost to others that his actions had caused. Early on, his lack of care for others was staggering and his inability to see that what he was doing was wrong was amazing.

I have read many reviews of this book where readers love the story – and think that Rogge is likable. In some cases reviewers have wanted him to get away without being punished. Clearly it is an enjoyable read for many. My thirteen year old daughter loved the book and read it the instant it arrived! Note: there are some swear words and parents may want to restrict reading of this book to adults.

All that being said, as a first book by Batty it is a good one. The work involved in collecting and collating all the letters and notes from Rogge has been put together well and they do tell a story of adventure, friendship and love.

Worth a look. If you love crime and adventure you will love this! Check out the trailer for the new movie!

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I read this biography with interest and bought it when it first came out thinking that Diane Cilento would have had such a fascinating life that I wouldn’t be able to put it down. Written by Ms Cilento, I found that the reading was hard going and I must admit not as interesting as I thought it would be. Maybe that is because being an Australian myself I wanted to hear about more of her life over seas, I don’t know for sure.

She certainly had an interesting life! The book doesn’t dwell as much on her life with Sean Connery as I thought it might and focuses on her life back in Australia after that marriage broke down. Ms Cilento was certainly a survivor who chose to live her life according to her own rules. The cover and photographs are really high quality and the writing is also good and easy to read.

Sadly, Ms Cilento died on October 6 2011, at the age of 78 in far north Queensland where she lived after a long illness and will be missed by many. See news article here from the Australian for more details.

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I haven’t read this book personally, but I friend of mine said that it was a great read, and was keen enough on the book that he was tweeting about it whilst reading it, so that says to me that it is worth a read.

“By day he made thousands of dollars a minute. By night he spent it as fast as he could, on drugs, sex, and international globe-trotting. From the binge that sank a 170-foot motor yacht, crashed a Gulfstream jet, and ran up a $700,000 hotel tab, to the wife and kids who waited for him at home, and the fast-talking, hard-partying young stockbrokers who called him king and did his bidding, here, in his own inimitable words, is the story of the ill-fated genius they called…” [Amazon].

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When I first saw this book cover I was amazed. I was in an airport travelling to a work assignment and couldn’t believe a biography could have such a cover! I had never heard of Anthony Kiedis and was so fascinated by the blurb on the cover that I just had to have it. This was one of the first biographies that I brought and it started me on a journey that still continues today – I love biographies and this is a great one.

“In SCAR TISSUE Anthony Kiedis, charismatic and highly articulate frontman of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, recounts his remarkable life story, and the history of the band itself. Raised in the Midwest, he moved to LA aged eleven to live with his father Blackie, purveyor of pills, pot, and cocaine to the Hollywood elite. After a brief child-acting career, Kiedis dropped out of U.C.L.A. and plunged headfirst into the demimonde of the L.A. underground music scene. He formed the band with three schoolfriends – and found his life’s purpose. Crisscrossing the country, the Chili Peppers were musical innovators and influenced a whole generation of musicians. But there’s a price to pay for both success and excess and in SCAR TISSUE, Kiedis writes candidly of the overdose death of his soul mate and band mate, Hillel Slovak, and his own ongoing struggle with an addiction to drugs. SCAR TISSUE far transcends the typical rock biography, because Anthony Kiedis is anything but a typical rock star. It is instead a compelling story of dedication and debauchery, of intrigue and integrity, of recklessness and redemption.” [Amazon].

This is a truely gutsy read, what a story this man has to tell. How he is still alive is amazing, but more amazing is the story of his friends and family and their conviction to seeing him through the dark days. It’s not just a story about Kiedis, although that is story enough for any lifetime – it is a story of friendship, of love and of determination. It is beautifully written with the words just flowing across the pages, which hardly suprising given Kiedis skill for writing poetry. You won’t regret reading this book.